Arizona Workshop – Day 4

Today's entry will be a little bit shorter than the other ones. Mostly because being outside for 8 hours in the Arizona heat was taxing on my body and most importantly my eyes (the white screen still kinda hurts to look at).

Our day was spent in "Old Tuscon", a western re-enactment town that supposedly was the original location of the city. Our goal today was to shoot as much as we could in 5 stations. I prepped pretty well, doubled up on sun block, took an Alieve to make sure my muscles wouldn't give out, but neglected one important thing. Sunglasses. After the first station I found my eyes to be very watery and hard to focus when looking at bright white items. I had to sit out for about an hour to adjust, and it wasn't until I was given a pair of cheap gift shop sunglasses that I was able to return. 

This, however, caused me both physical and mental pain. I was very frustrated that I couldn't shoot more of the models in a wedding type environment (something I really should consider more of for my portfolio). I was able to return for a location set in an old jailhouse, where I was able to secure most of my favorite shots of the day. But the eye issues and heat exhaustion caused me to get "Shot out" much faster than I typically would.

I've just returned from my nightly hot tub visit, and can mostly see ok without any issues. I'm hoping a good night's sleep can solve everything. Here are my top shots from today:

Arizona Workshop – Day 3

I'm tired. Today has probably been the most taxing day so far. Not really in a bad way, but after three days of humping 50+ pounds of camera gear on your back, eventually exhaustion begins to take hold. 

At breakfast I was given a chance to get my hands on a newly released camera, I didn't get a chance to shoot it...but I was told to share my thoughts with my Instagram followers. And believe me, I did. 

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After a very brief classroom meeting, we broke off into our teams and began some more specific one on one training sessions.

I've never really shot models with a bunch of other photographers all trying to get their own version of the same shot before. And although I felt very excited to finally be shooting something that really appealed to me, I also was frustrated because it seemed like everyone was struggling to get the attention of each of the models. I could tell it wasn't easy for them as well trying to give to multiple sources at the same time. 

Shortly after our lunch break, the exhaustion set in. I've been running on such an adrenaline high so far all week that my body didn't exactly have a chance to catch up. I started to ache. My muscles were at their breaking point. And we still had 4 hours to go. 

We ended up having an opportunity to do some optional night shoots involving light painting and longer exposures that was supposed to start at 7:00 pm. Once we broke at 5:30, I intended completely to attend, however, the hotel staff didn't exactly give us all of the details about where our dinner arrangements were. "Right down the street" must mean something completely different here. So after a 20-minute hike to the local Walmart, and then another 20 minute hike (and almost getting lost in the "desert" later), I finally was fed and only slightly delerious. 

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I got back to the resort around 8:00. Final images for the day were due by 9. I realized quite quickly that I DRASTICALLY over-shot for the day. All of that time fighting to find the right image caused me to shoot much more than I anticipated. I very quickly culled almost 800 photos down to 72, and then finally down to my final 10. I'm not unhappy with the work I did today, but I am far from satisfied. 

Once I have more time I will be going through and re-visiting some of these shots, as I feel many of them have a lot of potential and didn't get the time they deserved. Tomorrow is our big shooting day. 8 hours in the Arizona sun. If I don't burst into flames, I think I will have fun. 

Arizona Workshop – Day 2

It's probably the timezone, but this is one of the few times in recent memory that I was awake before the sun was. So, naturally, I decided to do something about it. 

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The morning light was something to see. Even though I didn't get the shot I wanted, I was still pretty happy with what I was able to capture. I'm probably going to try again tomorrow and capture something great. Especially since I know now generally where the sun will rise from. 

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The rest of the day was mostly filled with class work. Re-learning the basics of Photography. Even though I already have a pretty strong grasp on the concepts that were presented, I walked away with some great notes. If you follow my twitter account, you may have seen some of these. Maybe before the end of the week, I'll transcribe them. 

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After the classroom, all of us attendees broke off into groups based on our camera brand of choice (I guess you could say that anyway). We were further introduced to our mentors for the week, and given our task:

Every night shoot and deliver 10 final photographs based on the theme chosen for the night. Tonight it was "Shadow and Texture". That was it. No real other set of goals. We then were let loose on the resort. I fumbled around for an hour or so, snapping. I had a bit of a tough time at first because I primarily shoot people (Hell, my business cards said this for years). But as they say "The best things from come outside of your comfort zone". 

At dinner, I had a chance to sit down with one of my mentors for the week and had a very emotional conversation about life and my feelings regarding the work I do. He gave me a homework assignment to complete, watch Sue Bryce's video on fear. As we talked about the business of photography and our lives he re-assured me that sometimes it's natural to question yourself. But the trick to overcoming is not to listen. Later he helped me "kill some babies" and get down to my final 10 images. I felt a rush as we went through my first pass. I had missed having someone to go through and receive feedback from. 

Below are the 10 submissions for the day. I have probably another hundred other images that I took today, I'm going to sit on them for a while and let them marinate in my mind. Keep your eyes out for those in the future.

I'll end this post as well with a "bonus image" of sorts of the sunset tonight. It's only day two, but I already think that this week will be on my mind for a while to come. 

–Blake

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Arizona Workshop – Day 1

Hello everyone, so this next week I hope to post an update each day for an event that I was given the opportunity to attend. I'm hoping over the next 5 days to get some great shots. Thanks in advance for coming along for the ride! 

So some of you may already know that when I am not playing photographer on the internet that I am also both a camera salesman, and a diehard Sony lover. I was offered a chance to leave Atlanta for a week and take a workshop with some pretty huge names in the Sony community. I'm going to be a little tight-lipped about the specifics but let's just say this is a pretty big deal.

If you have been following my goals for 2016 you may remember that one of them is "learn more" and when I was told I was selected to travel to Arizona and have the chance to re-learn some old techniques, as well as discover new ones, I was floored! 

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This morning started off around 4:00 am when I arrived early (very early) to the airport. I needed to drop off a rental car (long story) and wanted to make sure I got through security ok. 

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Having some time to kill, I chose just to relax and try my best not to fall asleep. 

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I did, however, end up catching a pretty killer sunrise at the airport. 

Two flights later I landed in Arizona and made my way to the resort where the workshop will be held. After checking in I met up with an old friend of mine, Justin Briggs, of JBriggs Photography. Side note, be sure to check out his work. Great guy, and an amazing photographer. Justin drove 2 hours from Phoenix to meet me at the resort, buy a camera from me, and ultimately play driver and just kill a few hours until the welcome meeting. He also let me snap a few shots with his medium format setup, which I am entirely too jealous of (I'm sure he can say the same thing about what I am doing for the next few days). 

At the meeting, I was introduced to some of the other attendees, as well as a few of my "coaches" for the next few days. Said coaches have a combined 90+ years of experience in Photography, and I fully intend on picking their brains as much as possible. I didn't do much shooting as I was pretty tired after a long day of travel, but I'll share some of the images I happened to snap while walking around. Today was long, and the next few days will be even longer. But I am confident that I will be able to learn a few new tricks, hopefully anyway. 

But for now, I have a case of the sleepies. It's time to call it a night. See you all tomorrow. 

-Blake